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The Iconic-Symbolic SpectrumPhilosophical Review 132 (4): 579-627. 2023.It is common to distinguish two great families of representation. Symbolic representations include logical and mathematical symbols, words, and complex linguistic expressions. Iconic representations include dials, diagrams, maps, pictures, 3-dimensional models, and depictive gestures. This essay describes and motivates a new way of distinguishing iconic from symbolic representation. It locates the difference not in the signs themselves, nor in the contents they express, but in the semantic rules…Read more
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Introduction: Varieties of IconicityReview of Philosophy and Psychology 6 (1): 1-25. 2015.This introduction aims to familiarize readers with basic dimensions of variation among pictorial and diagrammatic representations, as we understand them, in order to serve as a backdrop to the articles in this volume. Instead of trying to canvas the vast range of representational kinds, we focus on a few important axes of difference, and a small handful of illustrative examples. We begin in Section 1 with background: the distinction between pictures and diagrams, the concept of systems of repres…Read more
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Beyond ResemblancePhilosophical Review 122 (2): 215-287. 2013.What is it for a picture to depict a scene? The most orthodox philosophical theory of pictorial representation holds that depiction is grounded in resemblance. A picture represents a scene in virtue of being similar to that scene in certain ways. This essay presents evidence against this claim: curvilinear perspective is one common style of depiction in which successful pictorial representation depends as much on a picture's systematic differences with the scene depicted as on the similarities; …Read more
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Areas of Specialization
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Representation |
Philosophy of Mind |
Philosophy of Language |
Aesthetics |
Depiction |
Perception |
Semantics |
Conditionals |
Philosophy of Film |
Philosophy of Visual Art |
Areas of Interest
7 more